Easily Create Animated GIFs with GifCam

GIFs are considered an important part of the internet. They are being used extensively on websites as buttons, icons, banners, advertisements and what not. If you are wondering about how to create those images, you should know that creating GIF images may not be one of the most easiest things to do. If you search the internet you will come across a number of tools that can help you create GIF images using GIMP and Photoshop as well but it can be a very time consuming task especially when you don’t have any experience in using these programs.

In case of web applications, they may be better when it comes to creating GIF animations but they may not provide you with as many features as a desktop tool and may not be as simple as you think. Today, we came across a very handy desktop utility, GIFCam that allows users to create animated GIFs from their desktop. It’s more of a screen recording app that records your actions and save them as GIF images.

What is GifCam?

GifCam is a very handy portable utility that allows users to create animated GIF images without installing anything on your computer. You can manually adjust the size of the screen to fit your desktop and start recording. Everything that comes in the frame is recorded and saved in an image format. It might be a better alternative than saving the screencasts as video files as they are larger in size and may not work on every device. The best of all, users can easily share them with anyone they want via email or any other social network.

Features and Usage

Using GifCam is simple and straightforward. To get started, all you have to do is download the portable package from their website and run it. This is the best thing I like about this app, you don’t have to install anything on your computer. Just open the file and it will open GifCam main screen. You can adjust the size of the frame by dragging the window from the corner, same as you do with any other windows app.

After adjusting the frame, just click on Rec and it will start recording anything on your desktop that comes into the frame. You can simply record anything ranging from your desktop to games to YouTube videos or simply anything for that matter. This can be really helpful if you are helping anyone solve some computer related problem or even if you are just showing them how to perform a specific task on their computer.

One feature I like about GifCam is that if the software finds out that the previous frame is same as the new recorded frame, it will automatically add delay instead of adding new frames which increases the size of the GIF. If you want, you can even record a single frame as well. Clicking on the Frame button multiple times will increase the delay time (in milliseconds).

The tool also allows users to view the created GIF image and edit frames before saving the final product. From within the app, you can easily adjust the delay time, add/remove different frames and more. Just right click on any frame and it will show you all the options that can be used to edit the image.

The tool also offers a wide range of saving options to its users as well. By default, the save mode is set to Quantize but you can easily change the saving options to 256 colors, 20 colors, grayscale or monochrome in order to manage the size of the created GIF image. Now, just save the file and you are done.

Here is a sample of something I created using GifCam. The delay time in the image below is set to 0.2 seconds but you can change it easily from the edit screen.

Wrap Up

In the past, I have used many online utilities and even Photoshop, to create GIF images but it cannot get any simpler than this. It’s all up to your creativity on what you can create using this tool. If you want, you can take a look at some of the samples the developer has created using this tool and you will be amazed.

Best of all, the tool does not require you to install any third party add-on or tool to make it work, it’s portable. I am one of those people who never installs anything on my computer until and unless I find the tool really useful. In conclusion, I must say that it’s a very useful portable application that can come in handy in many different situations such as creating images or even guides to help other users.

Did you try GifCam? Feel free to share your thoughts about it in the comments below.